Chapter 26
The nursery was already bright with morning when Lydia slipped inside. Her little brother lay in his cradle, pink fists waving, dark eyes wide open. She swooped down with a triumphant laugh.
“Up, my little knight! Up, Sir Henry Thomas!” She lifted him and spun, bare feet light on the rug, her shift hem brushing his tiny toes. She hummed first, then let the tune spill into nonsense words:
“Marching, Henry Thomas mine,
Grandfathers’ names and Father’s line…”
The baby gurgled at her bouncing rhythm. Lydia swayed with him, stamping little steps as though they led a parade.
From the corner, Ron stood with his arms folded. He had been there when she entered, as he always was—silent, solid, immovable as the nursery fire-iron. His watchful eyes followed every skip.
When Lydia spun too fast, his hand lifted—only a little, not quite a command.
Lydia laughed and spun once more anyway, daring consequence to keep pace. Ron’s hand fell.
He said nothing.
Her mother appeared in the doorway, her eyes softening. She lifted her hands, quick with sign.
Too much spin, Lydia. He is small yet.
Lydia slowed, exaggerated the step into a mock minuet, bowing to her brother as if he were a partner at Almack’s. Her mother laughed silently, shoulders shaking.
Mrs Ecclestone—precise as ever—arrived, rapping her knuckles on the doorframe. “That will do, Lady Lydia. Enough. Lessons await. Have you broken your fast?”
Lydia pressed a noisy kiss to Henry’s stomach. “I have, with this yummy morsel!” she declared, pretending to nibble his belly. The infant squealed, delighted, little legs kicking. Lydia nuzzled him once more, triumphant.
Mrs Ecclestone sniffed, unimpressed. “That will not sustain you through Latin declensions.”
“It sustains me far better than Latin ever shall,” Lydia answered, planting one last kiss to her brother’s brow.
She placed him back into his cradle with exaggerated ceremony. “One day, you will dance as I do,” she whispered, “and I shall teach you tunes no governess knows.”
She straightened, smoothed her gown, crossed to the window and back again, skirts brushing the toy chest. She still counted steps and turns, the way she once counted gates—order gave her courage.
With a last conspiratorial glance at her brother, she followed Mrs Ecclestone from the room. Ron fell into step behind her, as constant as her own shadow.
* * *
Lydia darted past the breakfast table before anyone could scold her, straight to the salver on the sideboard.
Letters from Derby, from Town, from half the county—but never Langston’s.
She fingered the neat crests pressed into wax, her lip caught between her teeth.
Ron cleared his throat behind her, a single low note of reminder.
She dropped the envelopes, cheeks hot, and flounced into her chair.
“Any from Langston?” she asked anyway.
Her mother signed softly across the table: He writes when he can.
“But he can, always!” Lydia pressed. “School is only a building. A man may post a letter every day if he chooses.”
Her grandfather rustled his newspaper, lowering it just enough to mutter, “A man may not, when masters keep him to his tasks.”
That silenced her, though not her sulk. She ate her porridge crossly, then rose for lessons.
The day’s order lay on Mrs Ecclestone’s writing desk:
Monsieur Dufresne, French and Composition.
Mr Abernathy, Latin and Arithmetic.
Signor Albrighi, music.
Mrs Morton, drawing and embroidery.
And, that afternoon, a gallop in the park if the weather cleared.
Dufresne bowed with Gallic flourish, his accent turning her bonjour into a song.
She repeated his words quickly, sometimes wickedly twisting them to make the maids giggle.
Abernathy smelt of dust and old ink; his arithmetic drills made her toes itch.
Albrighi hammered the pianoforte like a general drilling his troops, while Mrs Morton sighed over Lydia’s inattention to petals and thread.
But every hour, in every chamber, Lydia’s eyes strayed towards the doors. Would a boy burst in, tall and laughing, hair full of wind? Would a letter slip under the sill? Each disappointment added to the knot forming in her small, proud chest.
* * *
The next morning, she crept down before the footmen had finished laying out the silver. Pale dawn slanted across the hall, and the salver gleamed on the sideboard, stacked with folded packets still smelling of wax and dust.
Her fingers hovered, heart thudding as she read the superscriptions—county, London, Derby—until one smaller envelope caught her eye. The script was clumsy, bold, with ink blotted in one corner. Langston’s hand.
She snatched it up before anyone else might see, pressing it against her shift as if it were gold. Ron shifted behind her, arms folded, expression unreadable.
“Do not tell,” she whispered to him. He only blinked, but she fancied she saw the smallest tilt of his head—a tacit truce.
She broke the seal with shaking fingers and read in gulps.
Langston’s words tumbled, uneven but his: tales of lessons he loathed, a horse he longed to ride, a jest at a master who snored in chapel.
At the bottom, a crooked flourish: Tell Mother I am well.
Tell Father I try. Tell Henry—if he grows teeth—he must bite for both of us.
A laugh burst from her throat, sudden and bright. She kissed the page, ink and all, then folded it tight and hid it in her bodice before anyone came down.
When her mother entered, Lydia flew to her, signing fast, He wrote! He wrote! until her hands tangled in excitement. Her mother smoothed them, smiled, and kissed her hair.
For the rest of the day, Lydia endured French verbs and Latin declensions with a secret smile, one hand pressed often to the warm crackle of paper hidden close to her heart.
That evening, Lydia claimed the nursery writing desk for herself, her hair tumbled from lessons, cheeks still warm with excitement. Henry Thomas lay on a blanket beside her, fists pumping as if to cheer each scratch of the quill.
“Now, Sir Knight,” she told him, “You must help me answer Langston. He must know we have considered all his news very seriously.” She dipped the quill, tongue caught at the corner of her mouth.
She read aloud as she wrote, pausing for her brother’s coos.
“You say your master snores in chapel. I should like to hear it myself, for I am certain I could keep the tune better.” She grinned and tickled his chin. “Yes, we shall scold him for mocking sermons, but only a little.”
Another line:
“You speak of missing horses. Shall I tell Father you ought to have your own? Or better still—Henry Thomas and I shall demand a dog to keep you company. A great one. Perhaps so noble he could make Ron break silence to command him!” She turned to Henry.
“Shall we write that, little knight? Yes, we shall.”
The quill scratched on.
“You jest of our brother’s teeth. He has none yet, but when they come, we shall train him to bite at once. He will begin with you, so you may learn never to tease.”
He gurgled. Lydia laughed.
“We are certain you are taller, though I remain the cleverer. When next you return, I shall beat you at chess without mercy.”
She paused to consider, then leant close to her brother as if in council. “Should I ask for a pony for you, Henry Thomas? A very small one, to keep you ready for the saddle?”
His fist batted the air, and she nodded solemnly.
“Agreed. A pony for Henry Thomas, a dog for me, and some shred of sense for our Langston. We shall write it all.”
By the time the candle guttered low, Lydia had filled two full sheets with playful boasts, scolds, and schemes—all sealed with a flourish and a blot.
She kissed the envelope before she rang for the footman.
“There,” she told him, tucking him into his cradle.
“Tomorrow our words fly to him. And he will laugh until his sides ache.”
* * *
The family was gathered in the smaller dining-parlour, the silver not yet cleared, when Lydia raised her fork like a sceptre.
“I require a dog.”
Her grandfather choked faintly on his wine; her grandmother reached for her napkin with a sigh; Her mother’s eyes darted, bright with both alarm and amusement.
Her father leant back, one brow climbing. “Require?”
“Yes.” Lydia’s chin was firm. “For Henry Thomas. He will need a proper dog to grow with him. A boy cannot be raised without one.”
“He is not yet two years old,” Mrs Ecclestone said crisply from her place near the sideboard.
“Yet, he is off and running anytime his perfect little feet touch the carpet,” Lydia replied.
Her grandfather dabbed his lips. “We have hounds for the hunt, child, and Ashdale is no kennel. And Pemberley has a dozen besides.”
“I have seen Pemberley’s dogs,” Lydia said stoutly.
“Fine beasts, but penned up as though they were prisoners. I do not understand it. Dogs are meant to run with us, to guard, to play, to teach loyalty.” She glanced at Ron, looming silent behind her chair.
“Even sentinels are taught their post. Why should my brother be the only one without training?”
Her father coughed into his glass, the corners of his mouth twitching. “Your reasoning does credit to your heart, if not to your years.”
Lydia smiled, ready—
And then he leaned back.
Not away from her. From the question.
Something in his eyes cooled—not displeasure yet, but decision. Lydia felt it at once, the way one feels a door close without hearing the latch.
“Then you agree?” Lydia pressed.
“Not quite,” he said, though gently. “Dogs are not trifles, my girl. They bite, they soil, they must be trained.”
“Then I will train him.”
Her grandmother folded her napkin. “And who will see to Latin while you are chasing your hound across the meadow?”
“I can parse a verb and teach a puppy at once,” Lydia shot back, the words tumbling quick. “Langston would have helped me.” Her voice cracked.
That last hung in the air, heavy.
Her mother reached for her hand. We all feel his absence.
But Lydia’s throat was tight. She rose, her hands closing into fists. “You sit in judgment of what is proper, treating Henry Thomas as though he must shatter at a touch.”
She knew—even as she spoke—that the next words could not be retrieved.
“He is not of my nature.” She turned upon her father. “Nor does he bear yours.”
Silence spread, broken only by the steady tick of the mantel clock. Her father’s jaw had tightened; her grandfather’s eyes had narrowed. Her grandmother’s hand stilled on the table.
It was her mother who spoke up. A Fitzwilliam does not act in this manner. Enough now, daughter.
Lydia’s breath still came fast; her eyes did not leave her father’s. His normally warm eyes were flat.
“Forgive my poor manners,” she whispered loudly.
She sat down and remained silent. Once her grandmother rose, she curtseyed and fled to her room.